


Jackson Pollock

by eternaleponine



Series: Clexathon 2016 [8]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Foster Care, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-19
Updated: 2016-12-19
Packaged: 2018-09-09 22:29:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8915476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternaleponine/pseuds/eternaleponine
Summary: Clarke invites Lexa to join her family for dinner.  Lexa is not so sure that this is a good idea.A continuation of From the Mouths of Babes.





	

"Lexa? Can you come downstairs please?"

"Oooh! Someone's in _trouble_!" John Murphy sing-songed from the room next door. 

"Shut the eff up, Murphy!" Anya called back. "I'm sure you're not in trouble," she told Lexa. "She probably just wants you to set the table for dinner or something.

"It's not dinner time," Lexa said softly. 

Anya glanced at the clock. "Okay, fine. But I'm sure it's no big deal."

Lexa didn't move. She was running the past few days through her mind, trying to figure out what rules she might have broken, what line she might have crossed... and how bad her punishment was going to be. Anya had said that Miss Becca had never raised a hand to any of them, but you didn't have to physically touch someone to hurt them. Maybe if she was lucky it would just be scrubbing the bathrooms or something. 

"She's not going to like it if she has to call you down again," Anya said. 

"Lexa!" Miss Becca definitely did sound more annoyed now. 

When Lexa still didn't move, Anya sighed and stood up. "Come on," she said, nudging Lexa's shoulder. "Let's go."

She followed Anya to the top of the stairs, but when they got there, Anya motioned for her to go first. Lexa did, her steps heavy as she approached her foster mother, who was looking at her sternly. She saw Miss Becca glance at Anya, but she didn't look back at Anya to see what look she gave her in return. She just followed her when she went into the kitchen, and sat in the chair that she pointed to. Anya stayed in the kitchen doorway. 

"I just got a call from Doctor Griffin," Miss Becca said. 

Lexa frowned, trying to remember which doctor that was. It seemed like she'd seen several of them, but maybe they weren't all doctors. They'd never bothered with doctors where she was from; one of the people that lived there was a nurse or something and had found a way to get them doses of the shots that they needed, but other than that, any injuries or illnesses that came up, they dealt with on site. She'd been lucky never to seriously injure herself, because she'd seen how one of the boys who'd broken his wrist had suffered, and even after the arm was healed it hurt him a lot when it was going to rain or snow.

"Your friend Clarke's mom," Miss Becca said. "She was calling to see if I would reconsider allowing you to come over to their house for dinner."

 _Oh._ Lexa bit the inside of her lip and made herself look Miss Becca in the eye, because adults liked to see your eyes to know that you were listening to them when they were talking to you. 

"She told me that Clarke had asked if you wanted to have dinner with them and that you said that you weren't allowed. Is that true?"

Lexa nodded, then said, "Yes ma'am," because one of the rules (which was apparently a new one, according to Anya, implemented after Lexa's week of silence) was that when you were asked a question you had to answer out loud. 

Miss Becca nodded. "It's all right if you don't want to go," she said. "That's up to you. But I won't tolerate dishonesty. If you weren't sure if you were allowed, you could have said that you had to ask. If you don't want to go, just tell her 'no thank you' or if you think that would hurt her feelings, you can say, 'maybe another time'. Those are both perfectly valid, and honest, answers. But don't say that you're not allowed to do something unless you know that it's true. Do you understand?"

"Yes ma'am," Lexa said. 

"Good." Miss Becca smiled at her. "Now do you want to go? Because the invitation is still open."

Lexa shook her head. Miss Becca looked at her expectantly. "No," she said. "No thank you."

"Okay," she said. "I'll let Dr. Griffin know. If you change your mind, just tell me, okay?"

"Yes ma'am," Lexa said. 

"You can go," Miss Becca said when she didn't move. 

Lexa slid off the chair and retreated back upstairs, Anya following a few steps behind. "That wasn't so bad, was it?" she asked, flopping back down on your bed. "You weren't even really in trouble."

Lexa shrugged. 

"But why don't you want to go have dinner there?" Anya asked. "Wouldn't it be better than having to listen to Murphy get told a hundred thousand times to chew with his mouth closed, and the little kids spilling their milk all over everything?"

Lexa shrugged again. 

"What are you afraid of?" Anya asked. "You like Clarke. And don't you dare just shrug at me."

She didn't say anything for a long time, and she thought maybe Anya would just let it drop, but she didn't. She got up again and came over to Lexa's bed, sitting down next to her and putting her arm around her shoulders. "It's okay," she said. "Whatever you say in here stays in here, okay?"

Lexa took a deep breath and let it out. "I might say something wrong," she said. "Then they'll know."

"They'll know what?" Anya asked.

"That I'm not a regular person," Lexa said. "Then maybe they won't want me to be friends with Clarke anymore."

"Ahh," Anya said. "What could you say that would make them think that?"

"I dunno," Lexa said. But the truth was that pretty much anything and everything might tip them off, because she _wasn't_ a normal person. She'd never gone to a normal school so she had to take tests soon to figure out what grade she should be in. She'd never seen TV or a movie until she'd come here. She'd never been to a grocery store, or any kind of store, and when Miss Becca had taken her shopping for clothes she'd balked at the door and they'd walked away empty handed, and her foster mother had gone out herself later to get them. "Just stuff."

Anya sighed. "You'll be fine," she said. "I've met Clarke's parents before, and they're nice. As long as you don't talk about, like, killing puppies or something, I'm pretty sure they'll be cool." Lexa stiffened, and Anya looked at her sharply. "Lexa?"

"I've never killed a puppy," Lexa said. 

"See? Then you're fine."

"Only squirrels and rabbits and stuff."

Anya blinked. "You lived one hell of a weird life before now, didn't you?" she asked.

"It wasn't weird to me," Lexa said. "It was just life. I didn't know there was any other way to live."

"I guess not," Anya said. "Just think about it. It could be fun. I know it would make Clarke happy."

Lexa's mouth quirked as her face struggled to reconcile the opposing urges to scowl and smile. "I'll think about it," she said.

"Good." Anya squeezed her shoulders and then got up and went back to her own bed. "Now go play or something. You're way too young to be sitting around in your room moping. That's reserved for teenagers." She grinned.

Lexa just rolled her eyes, and went back to staring out the window.

The next day, though, when Clarke asked again if she would please, please, _please_ come over, _please_ , she said yes. Clarke threw her arms around her and hugged her hard, and then ran inside to tell her mom the good news. When she came back out, she had two popsicles. She gave Lexa the red one because it was the best one, she said. Hers was blue. "She says to ask Miss Becca if Friday is okay."

"Right now?"

"No, she says just by tomorrow."

"Okay." They sat on the steps of the porch side by side, sucking on the ice treats and not really saying anything, but the nice thing about Clarke was that she didn't seem to mind when it was quiet.

* * *

When Friday came, Lexa wished she had never said yes. Her stomach was full of butterflies, and she thought about telling Miss Becca that she was sick and couldn't go. She _did_ kind of feel like she was going to throw up. But then if Miss Becca found out that she wasn't telling the exactly true truth, she might be in trouble, and if she got in trouble too much, she might get sent somewhere else. Anya said that happened sometimes.

"Come here," Anya said, patting her bed. "Sit." Lexa sat, and Anya turned her shoulders until she was facing away from her, then grabbed a comb and began to work through Lexa's tangled hair, using some kind of spray to help smooth it out. She drew a line down the middle of Lexa's head with the comb, and then braided it down each side, twisting an elastic around the end of each braid and then tossing them over Lexa's shoulders. "There," she said. "Much better."

Lexa looked at her for a second, tempted to throw her arms around her and hug Anya like Clarke sometimes did to her, but she stopped herself. "Thank you," she said instead. 

"Of course. Now go! Clarke's waiting!"

Lexa went. She didn't even get a chance to knock before the door was thrown open and Clarke pulled her inside. "Guess what?" she said. 

"What?"

"We're having pizza! We even get to make it ourselves!" 

Lexa had seen pizza on the commercials on TV, but she'd never actually had it. She guessed it must be good if Clarke was this excited about it. She followed her into the kitchen, and climbed up onto one of the stools at the counter thing (it was too high to be a table). 

"Hello," the man on the other side said. "You must be Lexa."

"Yes sir," she said.

"You can call me Jake," he said. "Or Mr. Griffin. Or Clarke's dad." He smiled at her. "It's nice to finally meet you. Clarke has told us so much about you."

"Oh," Lexa said. She wasn't sure what Clarke could have told him, since she was pretty careful about not telling Clarke much about herself, and it made the butterflies worse. 

"She says that I'm going to build the two of you a treehouse," he said. 

"Oh," she said again, looking over at Clarke. "You don't have to."

He smiled. "We've been thinking about doing it for years," he said, "but we never got around to it. But now Clarke says that we definitely need to do it. I thought you might like to help us design it after dinner."

Clarke grinned at her, and Lexa felt her cheeks flush. "Okay," she said. "If you want me to."

"Absolutely. But first we need to design dinner. Do you want me to stretch the dough, or do you want me to do it?"

"We can do it," Clarke said. "You just have to start it."

"Your wish is my command," Mr. Griffin said, and he set a small pan in front of each of them, and took two balls of dough and made them flat before laying them on the pans. 

It turned out that it was harder to get the dough to stretch all the way to the edges of the pan and stay there than Lexa had thought. Finally Mr. Griffin said, "It doesn't have to be perfect. It will cook just fine even if it doesn't reach all the way to all of the edges." 

"Yeah," Clarke said. "Look at mine. It's all wobbly." 

"Next is the sauce," Mr. Griffin said. "Leave a little bit of the dough uncovered at the edges so you'll have a crust to hang on to." 

They scooped it on and spread it around, and then they sprinkled cheese over it. Then he put bowls of different things in front of them, and Lexa looked from one to the next, not knowing what she was supposed to do. 

"What do you like on your pizza?" Clarke asked. 

"I don't know," Lexa said. 

Clarke frowned. "What do you mean, you don't know?"

"I've never had it," Lexa whispered.

Clarke looked at her like she'd grown several extra heads. "You've never had pizza?"

Lexa shook her head. 

"Wow," Clarke said. "Well, I promise you'll like it. Here. I'll help." She slid Lexa's pan over so that it was between them, and began to grab things from bowls. "First we'll sprinkle some sausage around the edges..." she said, "and then some pepperoni... and a few olives... and just a little green pepper." It only took a few minutes before she slid the pan back over to Lexa. "Voila!"

Lexa looked down at the pan and started to giggle. Clarke had turned the pizza into a face. The sausage was hair, and it had pepperoni (whatever _that_ was) eyes with olive pupils and a green pepper nose and a pepperoni smile. 

"Whaddaya think?" Clarke asked. 

"I think it's perfect," Lexa said. "What about yours?"

Clarke looked at her own pan and considered. Then she began to grab ingredients and just put them wherever, sprinkling them down from air and letting them fall, leaving them wherever they landed. 

"Why didn't you do a face for yours?" Lexa asked. 

"I did," Clarke said. "I just did it Jackson Pollock style." She grinned, but it slipped at Lexa's uncomprehending look. "Come on," she said. "Let's wash our hands and then I'll show you." Lexa watched as Mr. Griffin took the pans and put them in the oven, and then after they'd rinsed all of the cheese and stuff from their hands, she followed Clarke into the living room, where she pulled out a big book and spread it out on the floor for them to look at. 

Jackson Pollock, she explained, was an artist who basically just put a whole bunch of paint on a brush and then just threw it at a canvas, and he got really famous for it, even though even a kindergartener could do that. Then she went on to show Lexa other artists that she liked, until her mom got home and her dad called them back to the kitchen because the pizza was ready.

It turned out that pizza was really good, and that Clarke's parents weren't nearly as scary as she'd been worried they would be. They didn't ask her too many questions, and when they did, she answered them without saying anything that made her seem too weird. After dinner, they went into Clarke's dad's office, where he put a big piece of paper on a big slanted table, and they told him what they wanted in a tree house, and he drew it for them until they'd agreed that they'd come up with the best possible secret hideout. 

"I'll start drawing up the plans this weekend," he said. "Maybe next weekend we can get started."

"Really?" Clarke asked.

"Really," he said. "Sound good?"

"Yes!" Clarke said. Lexa nodded. 

"We should probably get you home," Clarke's mom said, sticking her head in. "It's getting late."

"Can't she stay?" Clarke asked. "It's Friday, so I don't have camp tomorrow! She could spend the night."

"We would have to ask Miss Becca," Dr. Griffin said. "Do you want to call her, Lexa?"

Lexa shook her head. "Maybe next time," she said. 

Clarke looked disappointed. "Okay," she said. "Maybe next weekend if we're making the tree house."

"Yeah," Lexa said, even though she knew she would say no again next weekend. It didn't matter how much she liked Clarke, or how much Clarke liked her. She definitely couldn't stay here overnight. 

"Come on then," Dr. Griffin said. "We'll walk you home."

"It's just—" Lexa started.

"It's getting dark," Dr. Griffin said. "We'll walk you." 

Clarke took her hand before they crossed the street, and when they got to Miss Becca's house, she hugged Lexa tight. "Thank you for coming over," she said. 

"Thank you for inviting me," Lexa said.

"Any time," Clarke said. "Really." She hugged Lexa again before letting her go, and waited there with her mom, waving, until Lexa was inside. 

She went up to her bedroom and Anya looked up from her phone. "Hey you," she said. "How was it?"

"Good," Lexa said. "We had pizza. We made it ourselves."

"Nice," Anya said. 

"Then we designed a treehouse. Mr. Griffin says we can start building it next weekend, maybe."

Anya smiled. "And they still think you're a normal person?"

Lexa smiled back a bit sheepishly. "Yeah, I guess so."

"See? You were worried for nothing." Anya looked her up and down and then said, "I bet they didn't have Harry Potter where you came from, huh?"

"Uh-uh," Lexa said. 

"Didn't think so," Anya said. "Interested? You'll seem more normal if you at least know about Harry Potter." Lexa nodded. "Okay. Put on your pj's and come back."

Lexa did as she was told, and Anya held out her arm. "Come here." She scooted over to make room for Lexa next to her on the bed. When Lexa sat down, she tucked her under her arm and opened the book. "Chapter One," she read. "The Boy Who Lived."


End file.
